The last 100 years has been the era of the American Empire, which is monetized through the network effects of the dollar and dollar-denominated-assets. We don't have ships full of Potosí silver, but we do have 10% yearly S&P returns in an economy growing 3%. Extrapolating another year of that is probably reasonable, extrapolating another 100 years of that is probably not.
Yeah, it's easier to analyse the past than predict the future. I agree that I made a statement about the luxury of wealth the last century.
I don't know if the S&P500 will grow at the same rate the next century, but I am willing to bet a beer that stocks in wide index founds will grow faster than both inflation and average salary for the next century.
